APPEAR
If you're on a plane, and you're landing, and you've made it through take off, turbulence in the air, and descent, and you're about to touch ground, you can "appear" to have made it through the flight without the flight being 100% over.
If you're in game 7 of the Eastern Conference finals, and you're up 25 with 3 minutes left, you can appear to have made it to the nba finals, even though it's not a 100% certainty.
With only the memphis grizzlies having significant cap space, and them showing no signs of using it, the threat of someone making an offer to one of the Sixers two restricted free agents that would drive them up appears to be over. That's a very different statement than the threat is over. I thought with him throwing in the word appear, it made that abundantly clear and even went out of his way to avoid confusion.